Break
by xoxcrescentmoonxox
Summary: She tasted of blood that night. And for some reason, that’s how Sirius remembers her months later at her funeral. Twoshot.
1. Chapter 1

**I assume that if you're reading this you know who Marlene is, either from being a First Order nerd, from _Constellations_, or just because you, like me, are infatuated with the possibility that is Marlene McKinnon ;D But just in case, she's one of the people that Moody points out in the photograph that he shows Harry; she's the first casuality of the war. **

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_i._

It was the worst battle the Phoenixes had seen yet, and they were lucky to all be alive: that was what Alastor panted when he and the rest of the guard made it back to the Hogs Head pub where Sirius, Lily, Alice, and the few other Order members who hadn't been delegated for this raid but loved those going had waited.

Sirius jumped off of his barstool to Aberforth Dumbledore's slightly derisive snort about the kids the Order was seeing these days, but Lily and the older Alice weren't far behind him, and ran towards the scraggly group with no less concern. More, probably. James and Frank were both returning from the battle, and Sirius didn't have anyone like that—no husband. Or wife. Or a girlfriend, not really. If you'd ask him, he'd say he came for James.

If you knew him, you'd know he'd come for Marlene.

She was at the back of the group, her curly hair even wilder than normal. She'd been supporting Benjy Fenwick who looked to be hurt the worst of them, but Aberforth Dumbledore hurried over, ready to Apparate him quietly to Saint Mungo's. Marlene handed him off to the man, and then seemed to completely lose her calm, experienced Auror demeanor.

"You shouldn't have come here," she said, looking for all the world like a woman hopelessly in love. (Not a woman hopelessly in war.)

"There was nothing better to do," Sirius said lightly, looking the Auror up and down; making sure she was still whole. He knew how many battles she'd been through and knew that when a person has been an Auror for so long, they're apt to be careless. Thank Merlin, Marlene wasn't tonight.

"Stop." She said the word softly. "Stop it, Black. I'm fine. I promise."

Sirius gave her A Look, because even if he was young and naïve and Marlene could fight circles around him, he wasn't stupid. "Then what on earth are you doing talking to an Auror in training like me when you could be celebrating with the rest of them?" he asked with a forced laugh and toss of his head. He'd kill her with laughter if he had to.

"Damn it, Black," she whispered, and something collapsed deep within her eyes. "Sirius, don't."

Quitting while he was ahead wasn't something that had ever been taught to Sirius Black. Marlene turned away from him, pulling her jumper sleeves down as she hurried into the frosty November air, and Sirius followed, catching her wrist as the door swung shut behind them.

"Then you don't," he said simply. He wasn't sure what she was talking about now; if she meant fighting or following or _them_. But Marlene was gazing into his eyes with something unfathomable in her own, and she was _breaking_ right there in the middle of Hogsmeade with streaks of blood across her figure and moonlight pooling around her. So Sirius stopped caring if she didn't want it, because wanting be cursed; she _needed_ him now, maybe as much as he needed her.

She just blinked back at him; blinked back with no emotion or expression or _anything_ that showed her as invincible, fearless, battle-worn Marlene McKinnon. And because she was nothing like the Marlene McKinnon that Sirius knew all too well, he grew brave; stepped towards her and took her cold, scratched hand in his own.

"Don't be scared," he told her, looking right at her and pretending that he could see through to her soul. In a way, it seemed like he could tonight. In a way, for the first time since he'd known her, he was beating though the defenses she kept up like a fortress around her heart.

"I'm not . . . I'm not," she said, and if Sirius thought she was break_ing_ before, now she was _broken._

He took a step closer to her and wrapped one arm around her shoulders, still keeping their hands locked together. The yarn of her jumper was shredded in places, and her curls—her glorious, explosive curls—were matted down in muck and tangles and something dark, crusty, and red that Sirius didn't want to think about.

"It'll be okay," he said softly.

"How can you say that?" Marlene asked almost in wonder, meeting his gaze directly. "How will things ever be okay?"

Sirius held the woman tighter, leaning his head down and enfolding her all the way in his arms. She didn't resist or break away, and after a few seconds, she gave a little shuddering sigh and laid her head against his chest, fingers clutching at the collar of his shirt like a lifeline.

"Because, 'Lene," he told her, resting his chin on the top of her head as she let out a trembling little laugh at the nickname she despised, "The war can't last forever. We're better than them, stronger than them, and kinder than them, and we _will _win this thing, one way or another."

"Says who?" she laughed bitterly, a little bit cynical. "Says the _boy_ who's barely of age, who's fresh out of Hogwarts, who still believes in the good in people?"

"Says Sirius Black," Sirius replied firmly.

Marlene laughed, wheezing a bit. "Of course he does," she sighed, a trace of fondness in her voice. "And that's why he hasn't been hexed to bits yet."

Sirius grinned at the woman and drew back a bit, holding her hands in his own and searching her face for some sense of healing.

"Sirius," Marlene sighed, "I'm fine. Really. So you can stop worrying."

"I'm not!" he protested, but she shook her head and rested one hand against his chest, effectively shutting him up.

"Just don't," she insisted. "Just don't, and I'll be okay."

They were back to the _don't_'s again, thought Sirius forlornly, heart pounding beneath Marlene's scratched and filthy palm. "Don't _what_?" he asked as if to humor the older woman.

She paused, the hand on his chest curling into a fist. And then she looked up right at him with empty eyes. "Don't believe in me. I'm not as strong as you think I am"

"Rubbish." Again, Sirius injected lightness into his tone. "I've always thought you were as strong as a . . . a feather pillow, and you're clearly stronger than _that_, so it's okay."

Her bottom lip trembled a moment, and Sirius wished he hadn't said anything. "I'm sorry," he told her. "But I do believe in you."

"You shouldn't," she said flatly. "You've put me on so many pedestals; built me up to be beautiful and powerful and . . . wonderful, and . . . and seductive, and, Black, I'm _not_."

He swallowed hard. Damn her for making him remember how sexy she was, even bruised and dirty and battered. Damn her for not wanting him back, and for not even wanting herself. "You're all those to me," he finally said.

"Ah," Marlene grinned, "Sirius Black, the Order's very own king of broken hearts, strikes again."

He glared at her, trying to stay good natured and cheery when all he wanted was to help her. To gather her in his arms and let those sobs she'd been swallowing for the past minutes come out and get muffled into his jacket; to snog her senseless so she could forget and just lose herself for a little while. To be there for her the way she had unknowingly been there for him, those first weeks out of school when he was beginning as and Auror and had no idea what the hell he was doing there. So Sirius sighed, "My reputation precedes me, I see," and slipped his arms around her.

Marlene sighed, standing rigid for a few seconds before finally looping her arms around his neck and melting into his embrace. "Doesn't it always?" she asked wryly.

Sirius brushed his lips against the top of her head softly enough that he thought she wouldn't feel it. "Always," he replied, a metallic taste in his mouth. "Always."

Bringing one hand up to brush a lock of Sirius' hair off his face, Marlene muttered, "Black, stop screwing around up there. If you want to kiss me in this state, then bloody well do it."

She was his Marlene again—_just Marlene; not his_, Sirius reminded himself—and so he didn't feel the least bit guilty when she tipped up her face and he set his lips to hers. And he just felt _goddamnedbloodymagnificent_ as they wrapped around each other, there in the frosty Hogsmeade street.

She tasted of blood that night, tangy and bitter and dangerous. Because she'd been fighting, because spells had been flying, and because he was thankful that it was only a taste and that it was someone else's, Sirius didn't care.

In that moment, Marlene McKinnon was his; scars, filth, blood, and wryness all. And Sirius Black wouldn't have traded that moment in for _anything_.

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**The second part is mostly done; it should be up in the next few days. I hope you enjoyed. Review? :)**


	2. Chapter 2

**I hope that the tense change from one to the next isn't too disarming. Usually I would never do that, but this way seemed to fit. Enjoy, and I'd love to hear your thoughts at the end :)**

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_ii._

He almost doesn't come to her funeral. Sirius Black isn't ready for Marlene McKinnon to be gone, and he certainly isn't ready to say goodbye.

("To the well organized mind," Albus Dumbledore tells him knowingly, "Death is but the next great adventure."

But Sirius doesn't believe that, not even a little. Because for Marlene, _everything_ was the next great adventure, and there were so many adventures left for her to have _here_ that there was _not way _that she was going to leave so many of them unfinished.)

So on the drizzly January day, Sirius stays in the flat as Remus, Peter, James, and Lily come by in succession asking if he's sure he wants to wait; if he's doing alright; if he wants them to stay with him. And when they leave he stretches out on his back across the sofa and stares up at the ceiling and hates himself, because that day, he _knew_ that when you've been an Auror for as long as Marlene had you were apt to make mistakes, and he distracted her anyway. If he hadn't been so bent on getting that grudging, grinning compliment, then they wouldn't have been taken so completely by surprise; would have had time to leap aside as the curse rocketed through the trees and hit Marlene.

It was the Killing Curse, and she didn't have a second chance. One minute she was wrinkling her nose at him, and the next her eyes widened and she flew forward, the force of the curse sending her straight into him, her still-warm body knocking him to the ground. Around them, Alice and Gideon fought the Death Eaters back quickly—it had been a group that was young and inexperienced, impassioned only by the Dark Lord's cause. But Sirius hadn't moved. She was still _his_, maybe more so than she'd ever been, when she was lying there spread across him, her hair tickling his face and her head pillowed on his chest.

So now he stretches on his back and remembers the last time he touched Marlene McKinnon. He remembers her soft skin, her stiff limbs, her glassy eyes—and he tries to forget it all. Because she was _his_, but she wasn't _Marlene_, and Sirius still doesn't know which way he prefers her.

With a bitter laugh, he pushes himself off the sofa and staggers into the kitchen, head spinning. _Alive_ is how he prefers her. But that's not an option anymore.

The empty flat taunts him as he wanders aimlessly from room to room, her name echoing ceaselessly through his mind. It's as if she'd there with him, snickering and calling him _coward_ not to go to the funeral of the woman he loves.

"Shut up, Marlene," he calls to the corners of the room. "You don't know who I love."

She laughs again and tells him how bloody obvious it is. And then her voice is quiet, quiet, quiet until Sirius stumbles through the kitchen, through the bedroom, through the sitting room, trying to find her in the silence.

He gets her back in the hallway, when her voice is so, so clear to him that he _knows_ she must still be here.

"Forget me, Black," she tells him. "Forget all about me, and you'll do just fine."

"Shut up," he growls again, and then he realizes that he is talking to an empty wall and that she is fragmented, bits of her lost in the forest where she died and bits of her at the funeral and bits of her up in the sky, and none of her here with him.

"Shut up," he whispers again, and runs out the door to where he can find Marlene; Marlene without her teasing, biting words that tear through his conscience.

It's not until he's Apparated into Diagon Alley and has slipped into the small hall near Florean'sthat he realizes that he's come to her funeral. Thankfully, people are just starting to get into their seats, and he loses himself (behind a large potted plant) in the scuffle.

He doesn't let himself listen to anyone's words, as they come up and say something they loved or remember or miss about Marlene McKinnon. And he _definitely _doesn't let himself listen to their grief, as they shudder back to their seats weeping and shell shocked because they never thought that people would _die_ in this war. Even if someone was going to die, Marlene would have been the last to go—that was what everyone must have thought.

Or maybe it was just Sirius, believing so much in her that he believed that she was invincible. He leans against the wall and tips his Disillusioned head back, trying to block out the waves of sorrow that come crashing, crashing over him every time someone new goes up to speak.

And then it's over. Everyone files out silently, not lingering or socializing, because the whole situation just seems unreal. Sirius and Marlene, or whatever this _thing_ in the coffin at the front of the room is, are left alone.

He removes the Disillusionment Charm because she never liked to be snuck up on, then slowly steps towards the dais that holds her, each step echoing in the cold, lonely room. Soon a Gryffindor burgundy block of wood is the only thing that's separating them.

"Lene . . . Lene?" he calls in a whisper that still fills up the hall. Because she doesn't reply (_Stupid Sirius; how could she? She's dead.)_, because it feels like he's alone, because it feels like her coffin is empty, he pulls the lid open.

He isn't sure what hurts more: how still and angelic she looks, or how _alive_ she looks, there on a plushy piece of cloth with her hair a fluffy halo around her head, wearing ceremonial-issue Auror robes. With a trembling finger, he reaches out to touch that fluffy halo, stroking through the unnaturally smooth curls. It's lucky that her eyes are closed, because it just feels like he woke up before her after having one of their unplanned, uncalled for, completely scandalous nights together.

But Marlene doesn't wake up, and she doesn't bat his hand away, and she doesn't lean up and smack him or kiss him or any of the teasing that she always, always had ready for him.

So Sirius kisses her. He's not a necrophiliac, and he doesn't touch her lips or even her face. Just her hair, her hair that is still fluffy and flyaway, even if it's never, ever been brushed so well since he's known her. But it's not any kind of a kiss he wants. She doesn't taste like shampoo or battle or perfume or _anything _that he's used to.

She tastes like blood—tangy, bitter, dangerous. Because he misses her, because he needs her, and because this is goodbye, Sirius doesn't care.

In this final moment, Marlene McKinnon is his, fine robes and hair and emptiness all. And even though she's gone—even _because _she's gone and never coming back—Sirius Black wouldn't trade this moment in for _anything_.


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